I dont know why there is a lockout for these things. They drop the same level gear as HMs and it really doesnt even take as much time as a HM once you know the fights. I understand not wanting people to gear up so fast, but it just seems that people dont want to do HMs anymore, they just wait for EV and get the gear that way, or just grind out some champion gear.

I hate to say it, but the standard questing structure really discourages ad hoc grouping, because everyone has to be on the same quests, and be willing to do the exact same thing at the exact same speed. If someone in the group wants to go off and explore, but the others want to just quest, that creates conflict. Better to just do things at your own speed. Older games, you really couldnt do anything on your own, so you were forced to compromise what you wanted to do, and how you wanted to spend your time for the sake of being in a group. I cant say this way is better than the current solo setup, but it did FORCE socialization, if thats what people are looking for. Not to mention the faction system that has left certain sides (mostly republic) on some servers decimated, so you're lucky to break double digits on leveling planets. Older games had no factions so everyone was playing together, here half the server is behind a wall. Another thing is that, well, we've already seen the content a dozen times while leveling up. I've been saying since the beginning, without some kind of cross server lfg thing, trying to find groups for the leveling dungeon, with level appropriate people will be a real challenge once the population hits 50, especially on lower pop servers, either the players just arent there at that particular time, or they would rather quest because they've already seem the FP a bunch of times on their main. So your choices are to either skip it, or get a lvl 50 to run ya.

Can we please stop pretending that the forumgoers are dictating what bioware does? Its mostly internal metrics and their goals for grouping IE how many hardmodes/flashpoints they think people should be doing. My guess, they see a dramatic drop off in pre lvl 50 flashpoints being run, as compared to a month or 2 ago, and not enough HM being run. All this VS how many people are queuing for pvp.

Where does this sarcasm come from? no one is helped by having an attitude like this. 1) not all specs are created equal. Just to name a few A dirty fighting spec is a good spec for mobile fights, where a marks spec would be a liability to the whole group, but on a stationary fight, marks shines. Heal specs in pvp are completely unbalanced for healers, meaning they dont get as many medals as a tank or dps. Good specs are VERY easy to determine in this game, so dont pull that card. 2) the /who is very clunky, and I have never seem more than 4-5 people on my server using it at a time, and its mostly for heroic quests that mainly get put together through chat anyway.

*cut down the quote for space* The problem there was that the difficulty was ramped up to quickly. Wrath to Cata was a large difficulty shift. If they had cata be a more moderate difficulty, some where in between Wrath and original Cata then in the next expansion they could ramp it up some more. In the end it comes down to numbers and metrics, not forum whining. If the majorty groups who form for a dungeon, break up on a certain encounter, with only a minority finishing, then theres a problem, especially if people start to just skip over it, like so many were with stonecore, I cant count how many times people dropped group when that started up. And of course, even if there were no LFD, people just wouldnt have grouped up for it. The content then, is wasted. Kinda like now, when I dont think ive ever seen a group on my server looking for a HM other than Kaon, or False Emperor.

No, its not individuals, its the fact that its a mass market game, that attracts a wide audience. MMOs in the past were niche, meaning they attracted a small group of like minded people. These people, because they were like minded had an easy time getting along with one another. Not so with a mass market game because everyone is so varied. For the golden age of community to return, you need another niche game with a much smaller population. My game with community was AO, i remember it fondly even for all its mistakes. But that was a different time in a different market. For instance, on my server we have a french guild. Now this is a US east pvp server, realistically the vast majority of the server will not be able to interact with them because of the language barrier, unless they speak english themselves, which some do. I've grouped with em and they are good players. Everyone's personal experience is anecdotal but to share mine, on my server with ~100+ people in fleet at a time no one talks, no one talks on planets, all everyone does at 50 is stand by the pvp vendors on the fleet and queue, or fish on illum with the imps sitting outside our base. There's the occasional HM going, but I dont think ive been able to do anything except kaon in 2 weeks on my healer. People doing FPs beyond Esselss are VERY rare, and this is a Heavy server too. I've said this from the beginning, after a while, trying to do the sub 50 flashpoints is going to be very difficult unless you get a 50 or 2 to run you through them, because there just wont be enough people int he specific level bracket. What is to be done? Should we compile a list of the only 'viable' 'good community' servers and have everyone who plays the game reroll on those? that good community wont last long.

I remember a time I spent an hour looking for a dps for maelstrom. Honestly on my server there is no consistency of whats in demand, its just as likely to be dps as tank. Well actually there is one consistent thing, no ones a smuggler.

Everyone on my server just seems to either fish in illum or sit in fleet queuing for warzones (~129 people prime time tonight in fleet). No one talks, the few flashpoint i can do, people dont talk. There is no server community. At least with a DF, I could queue for something that I want to do and enjoy, more often.

I would think that the trooper could just redirect his generator's power to his healing probes instead of his assault cannon, like how they change cells on their assault cannon.

so....having rising respec costs does not encourage people to have the "best" "cookie cutter" spec to play with because, it would seem to me, at least with dual spec, people could have their "srs bzns" spec and then their "for fun" spec, or more diversity. That just seems really counter intuitive. Instead, everyone just has their "srs bzns" spec because they dont want to increase the cost of potential future respecs. Seriously, look at the trees, there isnt a whole lot of fluff in them. Its fairly obvious which talents will make you hit harder and heal better and take more damage. Cookie cutters are already here, and people will not deviate from them because of the costs of respeccing.

ya know RPG used to mean that you played you become your character, took on his skin and place in the world, not you play a tank/dps/healer

are you talking about solo content? because its all pretty easy. group content is usually based around a set formula of 1 tank / 1 healer / 2dps deviating usually isnt that great an idea. not sure about operations, but i hear only 1 tank is needed for pretty much everything and what 2 healers for 8 man? it wont necessarily make any encounter easier, and if it did only marginally, since I imagine only 1 healer could go dps, and enrage timers being what they are, I have a hard time believing that any dps would go healer or tank.

Anything to entice people to run more of the pve content, rather than just sit in fleet all day queuing for warzones, since its the path of least resistance to gear. 2 whole people /lfg in fleet on a saturday evening on a heavy pop.

I've noticed a few things. 1) commando healing in huttball is Awful, way to much movement, but grav spam from the rafters seems to work. But commando healing is pretty good for voidstar/alderaan 2) On my server, its hard to find dps for hard modes and operations, thats always the thing lacking. Not that many people do hard modes on republic side. I would love to have a separate dps spec to help fill the demand. But apparently according to some I would have no idea how to play dps since I didnt level as dps.

Enrage timers are awfully tight for a game with no way to measure DPS.